Author Topic: Some recent things I've found (Read 542 times)

bloom25 · « **on:** November 26, 2001, 03:42:00 PM »

As most of you know I've been very busy lately and so haven't been posting much. That's still true; I haven't played AH for about a month now.

Here's some things you guys might want to be aware of:

1. There is a reported (un confirmed) bug with ALL VIA chipsets and the GF3. It's only present in win9x (95, 98, me). Setting the AGP aperature size in the bios to 128 MB supposedly fixes it. Win2k and XP users shouldn't worry. The problem is a severe performance hit in 3d applications.

2. There is an msconfig now available for win2k.

Look in the news section at anandtech.com from about a week ago and you should be able to find the link. I beleive it was at tweak3d. I'll post it if I have time. I put it on my system and it works great. You will get a pop up the first time you reboot after changing startup items, saying selective startup mode is enabled. Just check the box to make it go away.

You will need to extract the msconfig.exe file into your winnt directory.

Toad · « **Reply #1 on:** November 27, 2001, 08:51:00 AM »

What should AGP aperature size in the bios be usually?

I just built up a system with an Athlon XP 1600, 512 PC 2100 RAM, ASUS A7G266 MB and (for right now) an ASUS 7100 GeForce2MX.

I believe the bios defaulted to 32MB on the AGP aperture size. Seemed small, but I didn't change it.

Anyway, there was no noticeable improvement in AH framerate over my old system. I have an old Abit BH6 running an O/C Celeron @ 850, 512 on the RAM (didn't ya just love WW2OL?) and an eVGA GeForce2GTS 32MB.

I'm sure puzzled. I thought the Athlon system would be faster even with the MX card.

Am swapping out the cards today and putting the GeForce2GTS into the Athlon.

(Even if it isn't faster, I'll finally have a computer that the kids/and wife have been warned NOT to touch under penalty of death.

They'll have the old one to totally FUBAR to their hearts content. )

Lephturn · « **Reply #2 on:** November 27, 2001, 09:38:00 AM »

Sweet! I've been looking for msconfig for 2k. I didn't find it at Anand, but I found it here:
http://www.ipkonfig.com/Downloads/

Works great.

BTW, there is lots of good stuff on that site. Shame about the pretty but incredibly annoying animated menu on the left.

Toad, normally AGP ap size is 64, but it will depend on the mobo/bios. I'd give 128 a shot to see what happens. If it doesn't fix anything, set it back.

bloom25 · « **Reply #3 on:** November 27, 2001, 08:56:00 PM »

Toad, the GF 2 MX card is certainly the bottleneck. A GTS is MUCH MUCH faster than an MX. Unfortuately even the GTS will be a bottleneck in a system that fast.

The issue with AGP aperature size only affects the GF 3 line as far as I know...

Toad · « **Reply #4 on:** November 27, 2001, 10:27:00 PM »

Thanks, Bloom.

Yeah, it has become obvious that I screwed up majorly.

As I said in the other thread, I saw that Best Buy Ad for the GeF3Ti200 @ $99 and told myself it needed buying. I had the MX card on the way; could have returned it. Should have returned it.

I'm kicking myself now. I always planned on putting the GeF2GTS in the new computer and using the MX in the older one. Only stuck the MX in the new one until I could get it totally up and running and ready to play AH. That way I could still play on a reasonable system while setting things up.

Well, next good sale on a GeF3Ti.. I'm in there.

Anyone want an MX cheap?

BTW, thanks to you and all the others that help out in this forum. I've learned a LOT in here. (But not enough, quite obviously!)